Posted on 08/16/2023 6:36:03 AM PDT by Kaiser8408a
“Ice Cream Joe” Biden is at Lake Tahoe for a week, probably to avoid being asked questions about his tin-ear respoonse to the tragic Maui fires that have killed 99 people so far. Instead, Joe is inappropriate chuckling (he doesn’t care!) and taking photo ops of him eating ice cream. The Biden administration angered a lot of people when it was announced that households that have been affected by the fires would only be getting a one time emergency aid payment of $700 while he gives billions for Ukraine.
After last month’s surprisingly large declines, Housing Starts and Building Permits were expected to rebound modestly in July data released today (still losing altitude from May’s major surge).
At least housing starts were up 6% year-over-year (YoY).
This won’t end well.
Speaking of not ending well, mortgage applications decreased 0.8 percent from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending August 11, 2023.
The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, decreased 0.8 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from one week earlier. On an unadjusted basis, the Index decreased 2 percent compared with the previous week. The Refinance Index decreased 2 percent from the previous week and was 35 percent lower than the same week one year ago. The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index decreased 0 percent from one week earlier. The unadjusted Purchase Index decreased 2 percent compared with the previous week and was 26 percent lower than the same week one year ago.
(Excerpt) Read more at confoundedinterest.net ...
Who is still building?
Who is still buying?
Who is still lending?
Why does the Fed have to solve every crisis? Natural disasters should be handled locally.
My customers(munber yards and truss plants) in OKC, Coeur d’Alene, Boise are all very busy.
My customers in Minny, Phoenix, are all slower than last year.
No one is as busy as they were a couple years ago. However, most economists were thinking and telling us we were going into a recession by the third/forth quarter of this year.
So, everywhere was very cautious the first quarter. It picked up significantly in April and May. It has continued to be busier than many anticipated.
There is still a new for new housing. What has changed is that houses are in the form of multifamily and condos more than single family stand alone.
The other thing they I keep hearing is that roughly 1/3 of houses being bought are purchased for cash. NO MORTGAGE.
Which typically means they are trading a more expensive house for a less expensive house or the same price and their current house is paid off. They are not getting as 7% mortgage to buy the new residence.
lumber yards NOT mumber
Thank you, and understood.
Except for who is buying the larger house that the downsizers are selling?
I suspect that areas of the country will weather the economy as populations continue to shift. But States like Cali, Illnoise and NY will be a drag on the economy especially as their unfunded obligations become due as more Boomers are retiring every day. The Feds are still printing money out of nothing at an alarming rate, and food prices are going up. Anecdotally, I keep hearing about it being hard to get replacement parts for cars, lawn mowers even a ATM was down near our house for two months because parts were not available. Even certain food items are no longer being stocked. Not seeing signs of a solid economy outside housing starts.
Houses selling as fast as they go on the market here in metro Atlanta. Inventory is very limited.
Are people or firms buying them?
Who wants to live in metro Atlanta?
Investors are doing a lot of buying but housing is pretty scarce so individuals are buying a lot of homes.
I don’t know why anyone would want to live in metro Atlanta. We are almost finished with the rehab of our house and are moving to our rural compound.
At 4:00AM this morning someone tried to kick our front door in. Mr. GG2 jumped up with his gun and went to investigate but they took off. Our cooler had been propped open to dry out on the front porch and it had been knocked over. We’ve had 20 break ins in our immediate area in the past couple of weeks. The crime is terrible.
Holy crap. Are you in ATL?
Fence, big dog. Or move.
I left North Atlanta (south Duluth) in 2020>>>to Huntaville.
Mortgage applications don’t document cash sales. I moved to a small rural town and homes here are being largely bought by other retiree buyers for cash. Homes form the 1700s and 1800s renovated and restored going for 500k to 1500k
where is your area geographically?
We’re shortly moving to our rural compound near Cornelia.
Eastern NC
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.